1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic device, and more particularly, a device having an apparatus and method for setting a power management mode.
2. Background of the Related Art
In an electronic device using a battery, such as a notebook computer, power management is important. For notebook computers using a Pentium CPU manufactured by the Intel Corporation, the CPU uses a Geyserville technology, which supports two power management modes, i.e., a high performance mode and a battery-optimized mode.
The notebook computer uses the high performance mode under the environment of AC power source, and uses the battery-optimized mode under the environment of a battery-only power source. In addition, the menu wherein an user can set the default mode in each environment is realized through Power Management applet (WordPad, Graphic Panel, or the like) in control panel programs of Microsoft Windows.
FIG. 1A illustrates a notebook computer 1 having a recess for receiving a smart battery 50 and input 2 for receiving the voltage from an AC/DC adapter 3, and FIG. 1B illustrates a schematic block diagram of a general notebook. In FIG. 1B, a central processing unit (CPU) 10 controls the overall operation, and a Geyserville ASIC 20 controls the mode-switching of a power mode driven in the system. A core chipset 30 manages the I/O interface between the system and a peripheral device upon receipt of a command from the CPU. A micro controller 40 handles the interaction of a keyboard, mouse interface, power management, and battery interface. A smart battery 50 is used as a power source when an external power source is not available or not used, and a power detector 40 detects the application of the external power source.
The conventional notebook computer system implements the power management mode of the CPU according to which power source is provided. Since power management is implemented by only two modes, i.e., the maximum performance mode and battery-optimized mode, according to whether or not AC power detected from the power detector 60 is applied, the power management is not efficiently achieved from an optimized power use point of view. Here, the maximum performance mode means a state where the load of the system is maximum and other devices are operated according to this. The battery-optimized mode means idle state of parts of a device, that is, power save state. In addition, in the case where the battery residual amount of the notebook computer is less than 50%, if a AC power source is plugged into the computer while using a battery only as a power source during a work on computer, most of the power is supplied to the system and only a part thereof is supplied to the battery, for thereby making the charging speed slower.
The above references are incorporated by reference herein where appropriate for appropriate teachings of additional or alternative details, features and/or technical background.